


A Life Worth Living

by breadthief (trufield)



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Fix-It, It's A Wonderful Life AU, alternate life sads
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:54:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21940030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trufield/pseuds/breadthief
Summary: "The Lord has answered your prayer and sent you a guide. Would you turn away from what you asked for?”“I asked for nothing!” Javert spat as he turned on his heel. “I did not pray. God has no use for me. He would be disgusted by how I've led my life, I am sure. In fact, I am sure if He had watched me, He would wish I had never been created at all!”“Well… perhaps that is a way I can help you. Let us see what the world would be like without you.”Javert meets a stranger on the bridge who will try and convince him his life might be worth living after all
Comments: 13
Kudos: 37





	A Life Worth Living

The streets were quiet. Too quiet. After all of the gunshots and canonfire, yelling and screaming, the silence was discomforting. Now that Javert was here, on the parapet, the rushing of the Seine was somehow soothing. The relentless power of the river, waiting with impatience to pull Javert beneath its surface. 

“Excuse me, Monsieur.”

Javert almost fell out of shock, only his natural survival instinct kept him steady. He had not heard anyone approach but perhaps he had not been paying attention to his surroundings. He turned his head to see an elderly man smiling up at him. Maybe he was senile or his vision was failing him - why else would he speak so calmly to a man on the brink?

“Monsieur, you ought to go home. These streets are not safe.”

“Only if you come down, Inspector.”

“I am… I am not on duty.”

“I do not think you would let a crime go unnoticed if you were off duty, you are a policeman at heart, at all times.”

_But I have allowed a criminal to go free. Defining my life by my occupation… both of these things are the cause of my strife!_

But the old man could not know these things, and did not appear to realise the perilous position Javert had put himself in. Javert sighed, he had been interrupted and had no desire to have anyone witness his derailment. He stepped down. 

“But you are committing no crime, Monsieur. Please, go home.”

“I have no home on this mortal plane,” was his bewildering response. 

“Family then. Go to them.”

“I only had my sister, and she is also with the Lord.”

Javert pinched the bridge of his nose. “Monsieur. If you are implying that you are dead, you are not. You are here before me, keeping me in the nonsensical discussion. There has been much bloodshed in these streets, it is late, I am very tired, and if you have nowhere to go then I think you must take yourself to the hospital.”

“When a person is close to death, their eyes may be opened to things beyond the mortal world, and their hearts, vulnerable and open, often send a cry for help, heard by those above.”

“You are telling me that you are a ghost,” Javert scoffed. 

“Something of the sort, I suppose,” the old man’s smile did not waver. 

Javert turned away and began to walk. If the old man would not leave him, Javert would remove himself. 

“The Lord has answered your prayer and sent you a guide. Would you turn away from what you asked for?”

“I asked for nothing!” Javert spat as he turned on his heel. “I did not pray. God has no use for me. He would be disgusted by how I've led my life, I am sure. In fact, I am sure if He had watched me, He would wish I had never been created at all!”

“Well… perhaps that is a way I can help you. Let us see what the world would be like without you.”

Javert's reply was a derisive snort, and he left the old made to fade into the darkness behind him. 

_Perhaps it is I who is mad,_ he thought. _This whole city has descended into madness._

He patrolled the streets, still smelling gunpowder in the air. He intended to circle back around, back to the bridge, but he did not quite get that far. A boy had ventured out to ready his stand of newspapers as dawn crept over the horizon and a dark curiosity overcame Javert, to wonder how the farce of a revolution had been reported, if at all. 

But why did he care to look if he had experienced it himself? When he planned to be dead within the hour?

"Boy!" He snapped, digging in his pocket for change. "A paper, if you please."

The child did not answer, did even react to him.

"He cannot see you, Inspector, for you do not exist."

Javert whirled around to face the old man who stood camly at his side. How could he tread so quietly?

"I have had about enough of you, Monsieur, and I refuse to be part of this ridiculous charade."

He turned his attention back to the newspaper. There was no headline about the carnage in the streets. His eye happened to catch the date and he snatched up the paper, holding it close to his face in case his eyes deceived him.

_3 February 1832_

The sun should not have risen at this hour, he thought wildly. It had only been the early hours of the morning when he was on the bridge. 

“Madness!” He barked. The boy did not flinch, instead he began to whistle. 

If the world had been turned upside down by the existence of Jean Valjean the good convict, now it was utterly incomprehensible. He must be dreaming. Perhaps he had fallen into the Seine and these were the nonsensical visions of a dying man. Javert made an effort to calm himself. For whatever reason he could not escape this gentle old man, nothing made sense, and Javert concluded it would be far easier to indulge this strange person until the world righted itself or crumbled entirely. 

“Well, let us say you are correct and I do not exist. I see no difference. The sun apparently rose four months ago, as it is wont to do. Paris is Paris and young boys sell newspapers.”

“Read the front page,” the old man directed in his infuriating, gentle way. 

Javert looked back to the newspaper. _Patron-Minette strike again!_

“I find it difficult to believe there are no competent members of the Paris police without me.”

“None so honest, dedicated and incorruptible. You know how effective this gang are with getting sympathisers within the Force.”

“Some people are better off than they should be, so what? I am sure there would also be those who haven't suffered unjustly when they would have done under my hand. Paris is worse off but I imagine Montreuil-sur-Mer is still thriving if they were able to keep their mayor.”

“You make a good point, Inspector. Although I am afraid it is an incorrect one.”

His bearing became somber at this, and his gaze became deeply sad and wistful. It was such a dignified yet complete expression of sorrow, that anyone, even Javert, could not throw scorn or argument against it. It was humbling and powerful in the quietest of ways. Javert was displeased to be reminded of Jean Valjean in this moment. 

“Come, let us see how Montreuil fared.”

Before Javert could regain his sense of speech and argue that he had no intention of travelling there, they had turned a corner and he found himself on a different street entirely. A street, he realised with some horror, that he knew to be in Montreuil-sur-Mer. Spinning back around, he found that Paris was no longer behind him. 

This street was well known to him. It was an area that even Madeleine's charity and finances had not been able to make reputable. In fact, it had been Javert's belief that the wretches that frequented these parts - whores, beggars and dirty children - merely increased their presence in the hopes of their beloved Mayor pressing coins into their greedy hands. This too was unchanged in this vision, surely in a world without Inspector Javert there would be _more_ scoundrels on the street. 

Before he could speak his mind, another person entered the scene and Javert's breath caught in his throat at the sight of him. His suit and coat fitted snug against his broad frame, and his hat sat atop dark curls flecked with grey. It was Monsieur Madeleine, still holding the same dignity and authority despite Javert knowing that he was Jean Valjean. To see him now with Javert's new knowledge of the man was astounding. Madeleine kept his head bowed, not to hide himself but in humble service of his citizens. The gratitude of those he gave his charity to was undeniable and Javert trembled to witness his goodness entire for the first time. He could see not only a good man, but a great leader of community and industry, something he, Javert, had denied this town. 

Javert was not horrified by the monstrous vision of the convict and the Saint forming the single identity of Jean Valjean as he had been on the bridge. Here was Valjean's ultimate potential realised, convict or not, but all the more remarkable for his long years in prison. It was blinding and humbling at once. 

Another player in the scene before him caught his eye - a woman huddled in a shawl. A whore without a doubt, certainly in need of money judging by the hollowness of her cheeks and her torn skirts, yet she ducked away before Madeleine noticed her. 

“Do you remember her?” The old man asked. 

The whore turned her head to look back at Madeleine, and the motion pulled at the scarf around her head to reveal shorn hair. It was the wretch who had spat at the Mayor who had offered to help her and yet he had still ensured her a hospital bed. Then came the demands to search for a child, and everything had tumbled downhill from there, the prosperity of Montreuil-sur-Mer included. 

_You have killed this woman._

The memory of Madeleine's words, with the roughness of Valjean seeping into his speech, was so clear that Javert startled, believing he was speaking in this very moment. 

“What of her?” Javert snapped. “I did not cause her plight, nor did I aid her situation.”

“That is true. Unfortunately, there is a web of misunderstandings which would only resolve themselves with your presence. You arrested this poor woman and the good mayor intervened. Without that opportunity for him to have poor Fantine drawn to his attention, she will continue to avoid him, believing him to be the cause of her grief.”

“She still died,” Javert spat.

“Yes. But she was given comfort in her last days, and the opportunity to secure her daughter’s future.”

“If you _are_ a messenger from God, then why did you not assist her in her time of need?” Javert sneered. “What makes me worthy of your attention?”

“It is as I said before,” came the reply, said with such great patience, as if Javert hadn't caused any offence at all. “I can only speak to you directly because you were close to death and seeking answers.”

“What use is it if you can only aid the dead?”

“You are not dead yet, my brother. People must be free to make their own choices, we can try and guide from afar, give them a sign toward a better path, but it is up to them to take it. It is easier if one has faith.”

“Anyway, what does it matter? She is as destitute as she was before.”

In a flash, Javert had a vision of a small girl in a dark forest, struggling through the snow in nothing but rags. The moonlight reflecting off the snow showed him her sunken, fearful eyes and the bruise on her cheek. 

He blinked, seeing Fantine before him once more, making her way back out in the open now that Madeleine had moved on. 

“No one knows of her child, whose situation will only worsen when the payment for her care ceases. She will not remember that she was ever loved, she will be ignorant of God-” His eyes shimmered with unshed tears as he raised them them heavens, as if seeing a different moment of the girl’s life. “She will not reach adulthood.”

“That would hardly be my fault,” Javert muttered, feeling strangely vulnerable. “But what of Valjean? Surely his life more than anyone's is vastly improved.”

“Alas,” the old man said with a slow shake of his head. “It is not. Let us see him for ourselves.”

This time Javert did not even attempt to protest, knowing that to do so would be futile. They walked the familiar route to the Marie. Had it really been so long since Javert had worked here?

As he climbed the stairs to Madeleine’s office, he found himself straightening his coat out of habit, as if he was preparing to deliver a report. He stopped himself and stuffed his hands into his pockets to counteract it. 

They pushed through the slight opening in the door - unnoticed, of course, by the lone occupant of the room. Madeleine sat hunched over his desk, illuminated by a single candle. Javert saw him for the first time without raising the mayoral facade in the presence of others. There was no grand reveal as the mask of authority fell away to reveal the eyes of a convict, dark with deceit. No, if anything Madeleine seemed to deflate and curl inward. He just appeared… tired. So very tired. 

“What is this?” Javert muttered. “He is ashamed? He is guilty? Good. He is living dishonestly. It is right he should suffer for it.”

“Has he not suffered enough for his mistakes?” The old man shook his head, not taking his eyes off Valjean. “He will never know the love of a child, and so he will never know of love at all. The memory of it is cold and distant. But what makes him suffer most…”

At that moment, Valjean flipped through the newspaper on his desk. He stopped and went back to a page he had passed, his eyes scanning whatever was there frantically. He paled. 

“It is a sign from God,” Valjean muttered, crossing himself. “How could I have known? I do not know this man. Now I do not know this Jean Valjean. There. It says right here that the man has been identified and arrested. A terrible man. How frightful…”

His raving concluded with a nervous laugh and a guilty look back at the paper, before quickly reaching out to close it as if it were a snake that might bite him. 

“You were not there to inform him of Champmatthieu’s arrest. A man has gone to Toulon for crimes he is innocent of. He is not a strong as Jean Valjean. Few men are. He will last a year before his ashes are cast into the sea.”

“Regardless, Valjean is a free man now. No one will look for him. He has become Madeleine and can continue to do good.”

“A man can never be free from his conscience…”

“Surely that is a better price to pay than life in Toulon.”

“For some, perhaps.”

Madeleine left, days and seasons passed by the window until winter arrived. He sat at his desk, his head in his hands. He tugged at his now white hair. 

“What have I done? What has become of me? Oh, Lord, I am a villain! How could you ever forgive me now? How could I believe you wished an innocent man to take my place? That poor man who called himself Champmatieu… I've thought of him every day and yet I did nothing to correct this error of justice.”

He clasped his hands in fervent prayer. “Tell me, what should I do? He haunts my dreams, damning me. He has the face of 24601, but we both know that is a lie. Oh Lord, it is too late! But how can I atone for this most grievous sin?”

Suddenly he jumped up, full of renewed vigour, but Javert was wary of the wild look in his eyes. Valjean quickly scrawled a note and brushed passed them, rushing out into the icy street to hand it to a gamin. He returned to his office slower than he had left, and he took his seat once more. There he remained, wringing his hands. Waiting. 

“Monsieur le Maire,” a voice Javert did not recognise came from behind him.

“Come in, Inspector.”

The man obeyed, pushing past Javert to enter. He looked like he very much preferred to sit behind a desk and direct his subordinates to do the work. Javert immediately disliked him. 

“Monsieur, I'm afraid I could not make much sense of your message, other than it was urgent. Would you tell me what has happened?”

Valjean dropped his gaze to his desk and nodded, indicating for the Inspector to take a seat with a shaking hand. 

“I have done a terrible thing, Inspector.”

“You, Monsieur?”

“Yes,” Valjean replied solemnly. “I am a fraud. But more than that I think I might have killed a man.”

“Monsieur le Maire! You must talk sense!”

“My real name… is Jean Valjean.”

“... Names can change, Monsieur. I still don't-”

Valjean opened his desk drawer to retrieve the newspaper he had kept - still folded open on the page concerning the false Valjean's arrest. The Inspector took it from him and frowned.

“But it says here that Jean Valjean is a recaptured convict-”

“There has been a mistake, I tell you! _I_ am Jean Valjean, that man, that convict! I stole bread, I stole from a bishop, I even stole from a child! Arrest me, Inspector! And have that poor man set at liberty!”

“Now, Monsieur le Maire,” Valjean made a sound of despair at the form of address, “please sit down and calm yourself. It says here this convict was identified by four others, there is no question. Are you feeling quite well? I will fetch a doctor.”

“They were mistaken. They were all mistaken!”

“Please, Monsieur. You do not wish to cause a scene. Come along, I will escort you home and I will get a doctor to visit you there.”

Valjean followed him outside with an air of defeat, Javert and the old man trailing behind them. Valjean had not even worn his hat, nor had he buttoned his coat. He seemed unaware of the chill winter breeze and it did indeed appear that he was not in his right mind. 

Upon arrival at Madeleine's home, the Inspector told the housekeeper that the mayor was sick, that she was to get him to bed and make him tea while the doctor was being fetched. Valjean was quiet and his eyes were distant as he was ushered to his room. 

When the doctor arrived, Valjean's plea was the same, and when the doctor responded by checking his temperature, Valjean drew up his sleeves to reveal his scarred wrists. 

“You see?” He implored. “I am a convict! You must tell them!”

The doctor hesitated a moment before pulling Valjean's cuffs back down. “Perhaps, but you are not Jean Valjean. That man was arrested.”

“No… No, that was a mistake. You can see where the shackles have been-”

“Monsieur, with all due respect, you are imprisoned no longer, if you were at all. You have a duty to be an upstanding mayor for this town.” He spoke as if to a child, demanding an end to a nonsensical game. 

“But… how can I? After all I have done?”

“I do not understand,” Javert snapped. “Why are these fools so blind? Why do they not arrest him?!”

“Who will want to tell the courts they have made a mistake? Who is there to care about the fate of Champmathieu? The town officials would rather not give themselves a poor reputation by admitting to the country at large that they wished for a convict to be their mayor. And you forget, Inspector, how impossible it is for people to believe that a convict could be a good man, and that Monsieur Madeleine here is undoubtedly good to the people of this town.”

Days seemed to pass. Valjean had effectively been imprisoned in his room, with no one wishing for him to make a scene. He ranted to anyone that came to him about his past, the citizens left flowers and well-wishes for their poor mayor who suffered so terribly. 

_It is his kind heart,_ they said. _He spends so much of his time with the poor and destitute, their woes and struggles have touched him too deeply for too long. He wishes to unburden them so greatly that he believes he truly shares their suffering! Poor man! It has driven him to madness!_

Valjean sobbed at any kind words that were extended to him, too tired to protest any longer. The doctor had begun calming him with laudanum, and Valjean did not protest that either. 

“Will they… Will they send him to an asylum?” Javert asked, watching Valjean stare at the ceiling with glazed eyes, a silent tear sliding down his cheek. 

“We shall have to wait and see.”

“Who am I?” Valjean said in a deathly whisper. “Am I not Jean Valjean? Am I Madeleine, truly? Did I come from Fravelloes at all?”

“Enough,” Javert said, turning away, trying to block out Valjean's continuing questions, his throat tight. “None of this happened, none of this will ever happen. Even if I took my life tonight, this would not happen.”

“That is true,” the old man agreed. 

“I will concede perhaps there was some benefit to my life, but there would be no tears, no strife, if I had departed at my moment of choosing.”

“You are wrong again, my brother. There is still much you can do with your life. Much you can give. Come then, let us see how you are needed.”

Javert had never been a coward, but he was glad to escape that suffocating room. The echoes of Valjean's torment followed him as he left, and he felt somehow dirty for leaving him there in such a condition. But it was not real, he told himself. There was nothing to be done. 

The next street they turned onto brought them back to Paris once again, and they stopped outside a house Javert recognised. He had waited outside of this house what must have been mere hours ago. It felt like days… years perhaps. The old man opened the door and beckoned him inside. 

It was almost as if they had walked back into the scene in Montreuil. Valjean was abed, staring at the ceiling with glazed eyes, except now he was deathly quiet, his eyes sunken and his skin pale. He was old, older than Javert had left him.

“Is he sick? I don't see how this is my fault.”

“This is not about blame, but what you can do to help.”

Javert frowned. 

“His daughter has married the boy you rescued-”

“ _He_ rescued,” Javert corrected, pointing to Valjean, but the old man only smiled.

“And now he believes there is no place or purpose for him in the world anymore. He is waiting to die. Isolating himself.”

“That is stupid,” Javert muttered, still finding it difficult to look upon Valjean in this condition. 

He rose shakily from the bed, and appeared so frail, Javert struggled to believe this was the same man who had dragged a boy through the sewers. He began to wish Valjean had not moved at all, for this was much worse to witness. Javert tensed against his body’s urge to step forward a support Valjean's trembling frame with his arm. To guide him to a chair and be reassured by the feeling of Valjean's muscle against him. 

He had to watch as Valjean held a little black dress and crumbled to the floor at the side of his bed, sobbing with such raw despair that Javert shivered. 

“I don't understand. What is this to do with me?”

“You are the only one who knows him. The only person he could possibly listen to.”

 _Ah._ There it was. Javert's life was only worth saving if he could save Valjean in turn. He almost laughed. How tangled together their lives were! It appeared there was no escaping it, but rather than feeling trapped, it felt somehow comforting. Familiar. 

“Very well, you can cease with your visions. I will perform this task that you wish of me if I can be left in peace.”

The old man nodded, and they left Valjean once again, his haunting sobs still ringing in Javert's ears. 

“You have much to give, my brother. The world will be a brighter place with you in it if you choose to do what is right.”

The front door closed behind him and the old man was nowhere to be seen. Javert whirled around. 

“Hey!” Javert called, but there was no answer. “I better be back where you left me,” he muttered. 

He contemplated returning to the bridge, but that desire had left him. He felt too tired, it was almost tempting to sit on the street. Before he could even think of where he might go, the door opened once again. 

“Javert? I thought I heard you out here. I was waiting… I am ready.”

Javert leapt at him, holding Valjean's face in his hands to look at him. There were dark rings under his eyes, and he smelled faintly of the sewer, but it was Valjean as he should be, his eyes bright and wide, his hair as fair as a snowdrift, the power of his tense muscles undeniable. 

“Valjean!”

“Y-yes. You may arrest me now, Javert.”

Javert barked a laugh. “I will do no such thing!”

Valjean recoiled from him, pulling away from his hands to look at him in confusion. 

“You are Jean Valjean and you are a good man. Yes. It would not be right for you to go to prison.”

“Javert? Are you quite alright?”

“Ah, perhaps you think me mad. You would not believe the tale if I told you.”

“I think anything might be possible in this moment,” Valjean murmured before shaking his head, bewildered. “Well, if you are not going to arrest me, perhaps you would like to come in? You may tell me this tale and I will see if I can believe it.”

“Very well.”

Javert stepped over the threshold once again, but this time invited in properly. As he settled his tired limbs into an armchair, Valjean brought him tea and really, it was the least absurd thing to happen to him that day, so he merely gave his thanks. 

If the flickering flames from the silver candlesticks shone a little brighter as they spoke, neither of them noticed. 


End file.
